Impact Investing

Four Horseman Investments

https://www.4hinvestments.org

Run by University of Puget Sound students, Four Horseman Investments (4HI) aims to provide students with a real world, hands-on approach to money management. To do so, 4HI participants run a peer-to-peer (P2P) loan portfolio that also intends to provide an alternative to payday loans. The nonprofit’s portfolio includes roughly 500 loans that are financed by many small lenders who can contribute as little as $25. 4HI participants also serve the community by providing financial education and one-on-one financial coaching to area residents and by volunteering as income tax preparers at free tax sites.

An Introduction to Financing for Cooperatives, Social Enterprises, and Small Businesses

Community Wealth Building

Hospitals Aligned for Healthy Communities: Place-based Investing

David Zuckerman and Katie Parker

Nationally, health systems have an estimated $400 billion in investment assets. Redirecting even a small portion of these resources to place-based investments would shift billions of dollars toward addressing economic and environmental disparities in local communities. It would allow institutions to more effectively improve community health and well-being, even as they continue to earn a healthy rate of return. This toolkit outlines a range of strategies for how health systems are using their investment assets to help address the resource gaps that keep communities from achieving better health and well-being.

As we learn more about what families and children need to lead healthy lives, it is clear that adverse social, economic, and environmental factors, coupled with racial disparities, prevent communities from building a culture of health. The good news is that hospitals and health systems are recognizing that they have significant, untapped assets at their disposal to help address these challenges: their investment portfolios. Through place-based investing, institutions can leverage these resources to improve their communities’ overall health and well-being. This toolkit will help you get started.

Newark's renaissance will be short-lived if companies don't hire locally

Kimberly McLain

Star-Ledger

Kimberly McLain writes for the Star-Ledger about the revitizaltion of Newark, NJ and makes an arguement about hiring locally:

[T]here are direct financial benefits to anchor institutions and businesses - hiring locally lowers recruiting costs, increases diversity and inclusiveness, strengthens employee commitment and loyalty, and reduces outsourcing costs.

Boston Impact Initiative

http://bostonimpact.com

Founded in 2013, Boston Impact Initiative invests in Eastern Massachusetts-based enterprises that are committed to its “triple bottom line”: economic justice, community resilience, and enterprise health. It relies on a range of integrated capital tools, including loans, credit enhancements, equity investments, royalty finance, direct public offerings, crowdfunding and grants, and provides support to both for-profit businesses and nonprofit organizations working to ensure the economy is more just, sustainable, and inclusive.

New Report on Opportunities for Impact Investing in Employee Ownership

Green Money

Green Money reposts the Democracy Collaborative press release on Impact Investing:

A new report by Mary Ann Beyster, president and trustee of the Foundation for Enterprise Development (FED), published by the Fifty by Fifty initiative of The Democracy Collaborative, examines the investing landscape for potential opportunities in employee ownership.

Read about it in Green Money

Social Entrepreneurs: Forget Everything You Think You Know about Raising Capital

Jul 5th, 2017

When you hear the word “investor,” what do you picture?

When I ask most people this question, they describe a white man in a suit (or, if in Silicon Valley, maybe khakis and a button down shirt) in a fancy office spending every work day combing through pitch decks, executive summaries, and due diligence and barking tough questions at terrified entrepreneurs. Read more about Social Entrepreneurs: Forget Everything You Think You Know about Raising Capital...

New Report: Opportunities for Impact Investing in Employee Ownership

Jun 1st, 2017

With income inequality in the United States at record high levels, employee ownership is increasingly being lauded as a potential solution to spreading wealth more broadly. Read more about New Report: Opportunities for Impact Investing in Employee Ownership...

Impact investing and employee ownership: Making employee-owned enterprises part of the income inequality solution

Mary Ann Beyster

With income inequality in the United States at record high levels, employee ownership is increasingly being lauded as a potential solution to spreading wealth more broadly. Most recently, research from the National Center for Employee Ownership released in May shows that employee owners have a household net worth that is 92 percent higher than non-employee owners. They also make 33 percent higher wages, and are far less likely to be laid off.

But employee ownership requires new investment in order to get to scale. A new report by Mary Ann Beyster, president and trustee of the Foundation for Enterprise Development (FED), published by the Fifty by Fifty initiative of The Democracy Collaborative, examines the investing landscape for potential opportunities in employee ownership. The report, Impact Investing and Employee Ownership, reports on the results from six months of research showing that the opportunities for impact investors to support employee ownership are limited, but that an investing infrastructure is beginning to emerge across asset classes.

Meet the Radical Workers’ Cooperative Growing in the Heart of the Deep South

Peter Moskowitz

The Nation

Cooperation Jackson is trying to build an alternative economy for the city’s majority-black residents...read more

The Role of Impact Investors in Taking Employee Ownership to Scale

Learning + Design Session | January 18th , 2017 | New Brunswick, NJ

Mapping the Journey to Impact Investing

The Surdna Foundation

Earlier this year, the Surdna Foundation announced the creation of a $100 million impact investment fund (roughly 10 percent of their portfolio) in order to align their investment practices with their grant making activities. This new guide distills the lessons learned in establishing the fund, including their research on the spectrum of mission investment tools available to philanthropy, detailed information on their internal processes and timeline, and discussion of key milestones and challenges.

I Can’t Keep Silent about this Anymore: Women and Capital Raising

Feb 22nd, 2017

I started helping mission-driven entrepreneurs raise capital almost ten years ago. My clients have collectively raised almost $20 million, with amounts ranging from $150,000 to $4 million.

About two years ago, I was compiling a list of the clients that I had helped to raise money. At that time, I could honestly say that every client that I had worked through the whole process with (i.e. if I excluded those that changed their minds and didn’t complete the process) had met their fundraising goals. Some took longer than others, but all of them had eventually reached their goals. Read more about I Can’t Keep Silent about this Anymore: Women and Capital Raising...

Gary Community Investments

http://www.garycommunity.org

Based in Denver, Gary Community Investments is a certified B corporation that provides philanthropic, near market-rate, and market-rate capital to efforts that support Colorado’s low-income children and families. Investments made in 2016 include a $500,000 PRI in support of Denver’s Social Impact Bond Program, which provides permanent housing and supportive services to 250 chronically homeless individuals. Gary Community Investments aims to invest all of its financial assets into community and business vehicles focused on improving the lives of Denver children and families by 2035.

A Practical Guide to Measuring and Managing Impact

Dr Lisa Hehenberger, Anna-Marie Harling and Peter Scholten

Measuring the "Impact" in Impact Investing

Ivy So and Alina Staskevicius

The aim of this study was to deepen the understanding of the specific practices and methodologies that established impact investors are using to measure the social impact generated by their investments, and to analyze the conditions under which each measurement method is most relevant. The intended audience for our analysis is impact investors themselves, as well as social sector organizations, traditional funders, and evaluators.

Network Evaluation in Practice: Approaches and Applications

Madeleine Taylor Ph.D., Anne Whatley M.S. and Julia Coffman M.S.

This article describes the evaluation framework and its three pillars of network assessment: network connectivity, network health, and network results.

Social Impact Bonds: A promising tool for bringing private dollars to programs that create opportunity for low-income families

John Griffith and Victoria Shire

This issue brief takes a close look at two SIB initiatives currently in the development phase, each with Enterprise’s support. One initiative aims to reduce chronic homelessness in Denver, while the other aims to reduce the number of days homeless children stay in foster care in Cuyahoga County, Ohio. The brief also looks at federal policy initiatives underway to promote SIBs and similar “pay-for-success” initiatives, including bipartisan legislation that would create a new fund at the Department of the Treasury to support SIB contracts.

Philanthropy and the Social Economy: Blueprint 2016

Lucy Bernholz

Philanthropy and the Social Economy: Blueprint 2016 is an annual industry forecast about the ways we use private resources for public benefit. Each year, the Blueprint provides an overview of the current landscape, points to major trends, and directs your attention to horizons where you can expect some important breakthroughs in the coming year.

A Checkup on PRIs

Margaret Laws

For one leading health funder, program-related investments promise to help underserved populations.

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